The Metropolitan Opera scrapped plans for what would have been its first tour of China, saying Friday that logistics could not be put together to perform Tan Dun's "The First Emperor" there with tenor Placido Domingo next year.

A makeup artist presses a pencil into the delicate skin around Placido Domingo's left eye, drawing a dark line. A woman's hand applies a touch of spirit gum to the tenor's hairline, to keep an elaborate wig from slipping.

A makeup artist presses a pencil into the delicate skin around Placido Domingo's left eye, drawing a dark line. A woman's hand applies a touch of spirit gum to the tenor's hairline, to keep an elaborate wig from slipping.

The Metropolitan Opera will transmit six live performances to movie theaters and will broadcast more than 100 live performances over the Internet or on digital radio in a groundbreaking attempt to expand its audience, the company announced Wednesday.

If you're looking for someone to blame or credit for the death of The Book of Daniel (replaced Friday by a Law & Order repeat, 10 p.m. ET/PT), don't look at the interest groups. Look at NBC, which dumped the show into an awful time slot in the dead of winter and allowed this superbly cast, overstuffed family drama to be painted as an attack on organized religion. Of course, advertisers shied away: Why should they go out on a limb when the bungling network is hiding under a rock?